Re: Yoshie, Leona Freed and the Native Indian question

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Richard:
>1. I did not "solidarize myself" - prematurely or otherwise - with Alan
Maki. I
>objected to another list member using scurrilous language to address
publicly on
>this list another subscriber with whom he disagreed. I know nothing about the
>incidents Lou mentions, since I have paid no attention whatsoever to Maki's
>website.  I leave it to others to titillate themselves with such things.
On this
>list, I address only contributions that are made on this list by subscribers
>thereto. As to Lou's repeated posting of items from Maki's website: I thought
>our policy was to avoid cross-postings....

Richard, this is what you wrote:

"Jim Craven publicly and scurrilously attacked a contributor to this list .
The
contributor apparently forwarded those public remarks to other individuals who
know Craven and have an interest in what he says."

You then said that whatever the consequences, that Jim "got what was coming
to him." Are you aware that vendettas in Indian country can get violent?

Look, comrade, you can't have it both ways. When somebody took the
extraordinary measure to sent email that Jim wrote to this list to powerful
figures in the Canadian Indian community without Jim's permission, I had to
ask myself what in hell is going on. Obviously, you were so upset with
Jim's 4-letter words that such potentially provocative activity (and that's
what it is) was not only excused by you, you applauded it.

Meanwhile, you continue to attack me for indiscretions while you show
absolutely no desire to examine your own indiscretions in this incident.

I did a web search on "Alan Maki" to find out exactly who in the world
would snitch on Jim Craven--that's what he did, comrade Fidler. He
snitched. And you applauded his snitching.

Now you continue to try to put me on the defensive by claiming that posting
compromising material from Maki's own website is in violation of rules
against crossposting. Who do you think you are kidding, comrade? The
working-class movement needs to be very careful of unstable elements such
as these.

If somebody showed up at Canadian or American Trotskyist party headquarters
in the 1970s, when we were members, and announced that they were fleeing
from the USA or Canada because they had been the victim of a campaign of
repression involving the FBI, the John Birch Society, the militias and the
police department, we'd ask him what kind of evidence he had. If he claimed
that he had been arrested more than 60 times for spitting on the sidewalk
and that his automobiles had been fired upon in broad daylight, we'd find
all that a bit much. In all likelihood, we'd walk him to the door and tell
him never to come back.

In fact, one might even raise the possibility that he was an
agent-provocateur as the CPUSA apparently did in 1973.

My suggestion to you is think a bit harder about what has gone on here with
Maki and Craven. You are right about me. I do flame people. And I am more
of a "moderator" than a moderator. But I am also a good judge of character.

Louis Proyect
Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/